Why Taylor Swift Really Pulled Her Music From Spotify

Wish you could listen to 1989 on Spotify? Tough luck. Taylor Swift recently pulled all her music off the streaming site, because she feels like it doesn't pay musicians, songwriters, and producers fairly.

Spotify was broken-hearted over the split, and posted a rebuttal to Taylor's claims they don't pay artists enough. In a blog post, they calculated that she would have made $6 million every year from her songs as the site's user base grows.

But she's not buying that. In a new cover story for Time magazine, the CEO of Taylor's record label said that number is way too high. Scott Borchetta, who runs Big Machine records, says they have received only $496,000 for U.S. streaming of Taylor's songs, and they make more every year from putting her videos on Vevo.

Spotify's response? Their site is a giant around the world, and globally the label made $2 million from international streaming of her songs last year.

You could argue that a money-maker as powerful as Taylor Swift could do fans a solid here, but it's also really admirable of her to stick by her convictions, and fight for what she thinks is the right value of her music.

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